Tuesday, December 27, 2005

but have never seen a moose in connecticut. i shall keep my eyes peeled!

State's Moose Population Rising Biologists Estimate The Huge Animals Number More Than 100By STEVE GRANTCourant Staff WriterDecember 27 2005In what amounts to another eye-popping wildlife milestone, the moose population in Connecticut has topped 100 animals.State Department of Environmental Protection biologists, who have been closely monitoring sightings of moose for more than a decade now, estimate the latest population at "just over 100 moose."Moose were extirpated from the state for more than two centuries, and only began to show up in Connecticut in tiny numbers within the past 20 years. But like deer and bear, both of which rebounded rapidly, moose are multiplying, especially in the northwest and northeast corners of the state. "If this range expansion continues, we're probably going to have more moose than in pre-Colonial times," said Dale May, director of the DEP's Wildlife Division.There are no good records of what the moose population was in Connecticut at the time of European settlement, but biologists have long suspected it was small, because the animal is at the southern limit of its range in Southern New England. George G. Goodwin, in his authoritative 1935 survey "The Mammals of Connecticut," noted that there was no formal documentation that moose ever roamed the state, though he, too, suspected they did in small numbers.Because moose have no real predators today - centuries ago wolves preyed upon them in Connecticut - it is possible the population is larger now - or will be shortly - than it was early in the 17th century."Native Americans I'm sure had an influence on how many deer and moose there were. I'm sure they had some role in regulating the numbers," May said...........